Red Wings 7, Ducks 4

Henrik Zetterberg's third-period hat trick lifts Red Wings

Chris McCosky / The Detroit News

Detroit -- Lest there was any doubt about Henrik Zetterberg being among the ultra-elite centermen in the NHL hockey league, witness his five-point performance in leading the Red Wings to a rollicking 7-4 victory over the Anaheim Ducks on Saturday night.

"He's playing as good as he ever has right now," Niklas Kronwall said. "Shift after shift he's out there against the other team's top line. Z just kind of took it over tonight."

That he did. He scored three goals in the final 10:50 to keep the Wings on top of a wild seesaw ride in the third period.

"It was just nice to get the two points," said Zetterberg, who now has eight goals and 14 assists on the season. "I had a lot of chances early. I think I had five shots on one shift in the first period and I knew I just had to keep going. I got two nice passes from Clears (Danny Cleary) and they ended up in the net. It was nice to finally get some."

Impressively, Zetterberg did most of his work playing against another elite center, Ryan Getzlaf, who figured in all four of the Ducks goals (one goal and three assists).

"I thought that whole line was great," coach Mike Babcock said of Zetterberg, Cleary and Ville Leino, a line that accounted for four of the seven goals. "I thought Cleary (goal and two assists) was fantastic. But whenever we play against the dominant players in this league, Zetterberg always lifts his game and he did that tonight."

On the whole, though, Babcock was lukewarm on the win.

"I like that we found a way to win," said Babcock, whose team now has won six of its last seven. "But I thought we could have worn this team out and we didn't do that. We let them back into the game. I like winning, don't get me wrong. But that's not how we want to go about our business."

Here's how the rollercoaster went in the third period.

Anaheim tied the game at 2-2 at 3:47 on a power play goal by Bobby Ryan.

The Wings answered that with their third power play goal of the game, a pretty deflection by Pavel Datsyuk at 5:17.

Anaheim re-tied it at 6:26, on a snapper by Joffrey Lupul. Wings goalie Jimmy Howard, who had been sharp for eight straight periods, would have liked that one back. He got caught looking around and the puck went through his pads.

"That was a bad goal," Babcock said. "But so what? The key is to stop the next one and that's what he did."

And then Zetterberg went to work. He banged in his own rebound at 9:10 to put the Wings back on top, 3-2.

But soon after he was called for slashing. The Wings compounded that by getting caught with too many men on the ice, giving the Ducks a two-man advantage for 55 seconds.

"I thought we looked good killing that penalty with five skaters," Babcock quipped. "But you can't have five skaters. It was a bad penalty and it came at a bad time."

Getzlaf fired a slapper by Howard to tie the game.

"We talked the whole game about just keep playing, no matter what happens," Zetterberg said. "We knew they have a lot of skill on their team. We just had to keep answering."

It took Zetterberg 62 seconds to put the Wings back on top for good. He took a pass from Cleary and beat goalie Jonas Hiller with looked to be a harmless wrist shot.

Darren Helm scored 2:15 left and then Zetterberg got his hat trick, his first since March 19, 2008, with an empty-netter with 0.7 seconds left.

"I would have liked us to be better tonight, but in saying that, we're still finding ways to win," Babcock said. "We are going in the right direction and getting better."

The Wings jumped out to a 2-0 lead on power play goals by Cleary (his third in four games) and Brian Rafalski.

The Ducks got back into it with a goal by Corey Perry (13th) in the second period, which was aided by a giveaway behind the Wings' net by Jonathan Ericsson.

chris.mccosky@detnews.com